19Nov13

Suicide bombings kill 23 near Iran embassy in Beirut

Two suicide bombings rocked Iran's embassy compound in Lebanon on
Tuesday, killing at least 23 people including an Iranian cultural attache and
hurling bodies and burning wreckage across a debris-strewn street.

A Lebanon-based al Qaeda-linked group, the Abdullah Azzam Brigades,
claimed responsibility and threatened further attacks unless Iran withdraws
forces from Syria, where they have backed President Bashar al-Assad's
2-1/2-year-old war against rebels.

Security camera footage showed a man in an explosives belt rushing towards
the outer wall of the embassy in Beirut before blowing himself up, Lebanese
officials said. They said a car bomb parked two buildings away from the
compound had caused the second, deadlier explosion. The Lebanese army
described both blasts as suicide attacks.

In a Twitter post, Sheikh Sirajeddine Zuraiqat, the religious guide of the
Abdullah Azzam Brigades, said the group had carried out the attack. "It was a
double martyrdom operation by two of the Sunni heroes of Lebanon," he
wrote.

Lebanon has suffered a series of sectarian clashes and bomb attacks on
Sunni and Shi'ite Muslim targets which have been linked to the Syrian conflict
and which had already killed scores of people this year.

Tuesday's bombing took place on the eve of more talks between world powers
and Iran over Tehran's disputed nuclear program. They came close to
agreeing an interim deal during negotiations earlier this month.

The bombs also struck as Assad's forces extended their military gains in Syria
before peace talks which the United Nations hopes to convene in
mid-December and which Iran says it is ready to attend.

Shi'ite Iran actively supports Assad against mostly Sunni rebels, and two of its
Revolutionary Guard commanders have been killed in Syria this year. Along
with fighters from the Lebanese Shi'ite movement Hezbollah, Iran has helped
to turn the tide in Assad's favor at the expense of rebels backed and armed by
Sunni powers Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

Cultural Attache Killed

A Reuters cameraman at the scene counted six bodies outside one entrance
to the embassy compound. Body parts were strewn as far as two streets away
and several cars were badly damaged.

The embassy's sturdy metal gate was twisted by the blasts, which Lebanese
Health Minister Ali Hassan Khalil said killed 23 people and wounded 146.

An Iranian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said the bombs were "an inhuman
and vicious act perpetrated by Israel and its terror agents", Iran's IRNA news
agency reported.

Israeli lawmaker Tzachi Hanegbi said his country had played no role. "The
bloodshed in Beirut is a result of Hezbollah's involvement in the Syria crisis.
Israel was not involved in the past and was not involved here," he said in
Jerusalem.

Iran's ambassador Ghazanfar Roknabadi identified one of the dead as
Ebrahim Ansari, a cultural attache at the embassy.

A Lebanese security source said the bombers struck just before Roknabadi
and Ansari had been due to leave the embassy for a meeting at Lebanon's
Culture Ministry, as embassy guards were preparing a convoy of cars to take
them.

Fires engulfed cars outside the embassy and the facades of some buildings
were torn off. Shattered glass covered the bloodied streets and some trees
were uprooted, but the embassy's well-fortified building itself suffered relatively
minor damage.

"Whoever carries out such an attack in these sensitive circumstances, from
whichever faction, knows directly or indirectly that he is serving the interests of
the Zionist entity (Israel)," Roknabadi said.

He did not say whether other embassy officials were among the dead, but
Lebanese TV stations quoted Iranian diplomatic sources as saying none of
their staff in the embassy was hurt.

UK Envoy Gives Blood

In a sign of the tentative thaw in Western relations with Iran following the
election of President Hassan Rouhani, France and Britain both went beyond
standard condemnations of the bloodshed in their public responses.

Paris expressed "solidarity with the Lebanese and Iranian authorities", while
British ambassador to Beirut Tom Fletcher donated blood in a move his
embassy described on Twitter as "solidarity for injured in terrorist attack on
Iranian embassy".

In Washington, the White House condemned the bombings and called on all
sides in Lebanon to exercise calm and restraint.

Politicians from across Lebanon's Sunni, Shi'ite and Christian communities
also condemned the attack.

In Syria, the government said its soldiers took full control of the town of Qara,
which straddles a highway from Damascus to government strongholds on the
coast and is also used by Sunni rebels to cross into Syria from Lebanon.

The capture of Qara may mark the start of a wider offensive by the army,
which has been backed by Hezbollah and Shi'ite fighters from Iraq, to
recapture the mountainous border region of Qalamoun and consolidate
Assad's control of territory around Damascus and close to the Lebanese
border.

Hezbollah's military role in Syria has helped to inflame sectarian tension there
and in Lebanon. Many Lebanese Sunnis back the Syrian rebels, while many
Shi'ites support Assad, whose minority Alawite sect derives from Shi'ite Islam.

Ayham Kamel, Middle East analyst with Eurasia Group, said the embassy
bombing was an attempt by supporters of the Sunni rebels to weaken
Hezbollah and Iran's support for Assad, undermine the Qalamoun campaign
and possibly pressure Tehran before Wednesday's nuclear talks.

"While sectarian tensions in Lebanon will increase, Hezbollah's retaliatory
response will be centered on Syria where (it) will further commit military forces
to eliminate the Sunni rebel threat along the Syrian-Lebanese borders," he
said.

The Abdullah Azzam Brigade has strong links in Lebanon's Palestinian
refugee camps as well as connections with the Gulf. Two of its senior military
leaders are Saudi nationals, said Charles Lister, an analyst at IHS Jane's
Terrorism and Insurgency Centre.

"This attack is a significant escalation. After months and months of
speculation, an al Qaeda-linked group has now underlined its involvement in
the Syria-related Lebanese theatre," he said.

Footage from local news channels showed charred bodies on the ground as
flames rose from stricken vehicles. Emergency workers and residents carried
victims away in blankets.

"These kinds of explosions are a new and dangerous development," said the
head of Hezbollah's parliamentary bloc in Lebanon, Mohammad Raad.

Southern Beirut, a Hezbollah stronghold, was hit by three explosions earlier
this year. Those attacks were blamed on groups linked to the Syrian rebels,
believed to be in retaliation for the group's military role in Syria.

Three decades ago, Iranian-backed Shi'ite militants carried out devastating
suicide bombings in Lebanon that hit the U.S. embassy, as well as U.S.,
French and Israeli military bases.

[Source: By Laila Bassam and Erika Solomon, Reuters, Beirut, 19Nov13]

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